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August 24, 2012

Dodgers Awarded Waiver Claims On Gonzalez, Beckett

Blockbuster: red Sox, Dodgers working on deal that would send Adrian Gonzalez, Crawford, Beckett and Punto to LA. Hurdles remain, but closing in

Is today April 1?

Nearly every baseball player on every team's roster is put on revoccable waivers in August. Some players get claimed, some do not. It's not news. Most big names are put on waivers as a no-risk way for teams to gauge possible interest.

What happens in almost all of these cases is that the team simply pulls the player back. There is no real talk of a trade, and there is nothing newsworthy to report.

That's what I was sure was going on today with Adrian Gonzalez and the Dodgers. But then I read this, from the pen of ESPN's Gordon Edes:

[T]here is a growing possibility that Gonzalez could be headed to L.A., multiple baseball sources said Friday. ... "I think something is happening, but I'm in a state of disbelief that it is," one baseball source said Friday.

And then I think I may need to keep a quarter of an ear tuned to this one.

Gonzalez - who had no comment on the waiver story - says he's sick of the soap opera stoked by the Boston media:

In Boston ... they never talk about baseball; it's always the same. That's one of the reasons why I almost never talk to the press here. Very few times they ask me about baseball. But most of the time it's about gossip, rumors, plots, well ... a soap opera. When they talk to me about baseball, I'm available. But that does not happen often.

Before the Gonzalez story broke, the hot topic was who did not attend Johnny Pesky's funeral.

I've been reading the SOSH thread. The interesting thing is that if the big places are in place, and medical records pass, it's just a matter of how much salary to eat overall. A straight question of: how much would the Dodgers have to demand to make this no longer worth doing?

HATE to lose Gonzalez. Not sure Beckett and Crawford are as bad as they seem this year. But it would kind of Stop the Madness and let us start over in some sense.

I'm hoping someone can explain a detail here.If the Red Sox just say, "Okay, Magic & Co, Josh Beckett and his salary are yours," can the Dodgers back out? Or are they on the hook? And if they are, why don't the Red Sox do that?

(I read this blog all the time, but as you obviously know I have not commented -- thanks for the excellent blogging!)

I hate to see A Gon go too but this team cannot play together and Boston is absolutely loaded in the minors paying $20 M to players who can't perform to expectation is folly when you have Major league minimum guys sitting just waiting to bust out...the sawx could field 2 major league teams at the moment and the Jr club would likely beat the big club.

I don't think Gonzalez has ever been 100% healthy hear either I expect he will absolutely rake in LA....and we will have 10 yrs of second guessing....but has to be done, LA new owners want to win now.